Animal-inspired Exercise

These animal-inspired exercises are not only fun and empowering, but each drill is designed to improve your jiu-jitsu training. Even though these are solo drills, exercise is more fun with a friend!

If you are seeking physical education curriculum ideas for your home-school or private school, read to the end of this blog! I’ve got great lesson plans in the works for you!

Benefits of these drills

• These animal-inspired drills actually mimmic the movement of real animals, so go ahead and add the animal sounds when you train;
• When you don’t have your training buddy, these exercises are great solo drills;
• No equipment required, so go ahead and do them inside, outside, in the kitchen, up and down the hallway, at summer camp, on a rainy day, in the rain, etc.;
• Each exercise provides a full-body, strength and cardio workout in a short amount of time;
• Of course these exercises are physically challenging, but they are also mentally stimulating; &
• Each movement improves your future jiu-jitsu training experience.

Let’s get started! With each drill, set a timer and try to do each technique for :30 seconds. Build endurance and strength by adding time. These drills are not meant to be a race. They are meant to be done with the correct form and conditioning.

Bear Crawl

The correct way to do the Bear Crawl is to coordinate the movement of your arms and legs. Begin on your hands and feet. Your knees should be a few inches off the ground. As you move your left arm forward, move your right leg forward. Then with each proceeding step begins with the opposite arm and leg. As you can see from the video, I’m pretty good at the forward motion. But the backward motion is challenging for me. I can physically do the movement, but my body and my brain got a little behind. Be sure to keep your head up and eyes forward.

How does the Bear Crawl improve your jiu-jitsu game? I use the Bear Crawl when I’m about to be submitted by the Triangle submission. I “bear crawl” forward over my opponent which causes them to release the submission. Let me hear you roar!

Leap Frog

A strong leap frog will increase your explosive movement and balance in jiu-jitsu. The goal is not to take fast little jumps. Instead leap as high and as far as you can while at the same time, landing soft and controlled. Begin in a low squat position. Jump up as high and as far as possible and come back down all the way into the low squat. Make sure you control the landing. If you don’t you may hurt your knees or fall forward. After just a few, you will feel the burn.

Alligator Crawl

This is the most challenging movement for me. Much like the Bear Crawl, begin on your hands and feet and also move your opposite arm and leg forward. But in the alligator crawl, you will do a modified push up. As you execute your modified push up, your hip will drop to one side and your bent knee will extend out. You should feel this bent knee extension in your hip flexure. The deeper you can do the push up, the more challenging the exercise.

Coming Fall 2019

Physical Education Lesson Plans

The animal-inspired drills will be part of a brand new self-defense curriculum from The Great Flip. Each lesson plan will include

• Warm-up exercises
• Conditioning drills
• Stretching
• Self-defense techniques inspired by Brazilian jiu-jitsu

Welcome to The Great Flip

Are you ready to learn simple self defense inspired by Brazilian jiu-jitsu? Welcome to The Great Flip, online self defense and life skills for girls ages six and up.

If you have ever wanted to try a self-defense class, but feel a little intimated by the big gym experience, try training with me, Coach Jody. Each video is approximately three to four minutes in length. I break-down one simple technique per video and walk you through each step. You will watch girls just like your daughters, age range from six to 13 trying the technique. We had so much fun making these videos together. And you will have a ton of fun learning the techniques with your favorite girl friends.  Learning self defense is a great way to get in shape while also learning valuable life skills!

Click on the 2 Ways to Join to learn more about The Great Flip online self-defense videos. See you on the mat! – Coach Jody

The Great Flip is a national program partner for American Heritage Girls

Want to learn a simple self-defense technique right now? Why not!

Let’s learn the Wrist Escape!

Click 2 Ways to join to gain access to more than 20 online self-defense videos! See you on the mat!